Plume tracking by a self-stabilized group of micro aerial vehicles

Abstract

A cooperative odor plume tracking approach designed for use with groups of micro-scale, autonomous helicopters in GNSS-denied environment is proposed in this paper. The designed method is based on a particle swarm optimization enhanced for efficient and fast cooperative searching for gas sources. The possibility of MAVs deployment in GNSSdenied environment is enabled by employed visual relative localization using onboard monocular cameras and identification patterns. In addition to constraints given by the relative localization (necessity of direct visibility and limited range of the system), MAV motion constraints and non-colliding multi-robot coordination are satisfied in the method. The developed method has been verified using a numerical model of smoke plume in various simulations and real experiments with a fleet of MAVs.